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Tuesday, August 31, 2010

Today I add to Zach Trek two books that are both part of and supplementary to a Star Trek collection:

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Star Trek The Collectibles, which begins with a forward by James Doohan’s son Chris Doohan, is not only useful, but also fun to look through. It contains a dazzling number of quality photographs of the myriad items in author Steve Kelley’s collection, with photos for the majority of the items listed. I would call this book a “must have” for Star Trek collectors. The wide array of photographs give you a familiarity with a broad range of collectibles and make looking items up easy. The only catch is that this book, much as it contains, is not quite all-inclusive -- I do find items now and then not in this book. This doesn’t particularly bother me, though -- I just feel like I’ve found an unusual piece!

It should also be noted that, with only a handful of exceptions, this book deals exclusively with original series TV/movie collectibles (which is, of course, exactly what I like).

The Trekker’s Guide is more exhaustive -- I can often find pieces in it that I can’t find in The Collectibles. This book contains proportionately fewer photos, and it covers all series of Star Trek. This is the 2nd Edition which has a section at the end containing all the items added since the 1st Edition. This edition was published in 1999, and seems not to have been updated since, so there are more recent collectibles not in this guide. I enjoy having it as a backup for The Collectibles.

Both guides tend to set prices, in my opinion, a little on the high side (the authors are, after all, valuing their own collectibles). Then again, the prices are for items in very good to mint condition, which mine usually are not.

These are by no means the only Star Trek price guides available, they are just the only two I personally own.

Come back this Thursday to meet another officer from the Enterprise (you can probably guess who). Check in next Thursday for a small item that I couldn't find in either of the above guides, and sometime inbetween for a new category or two.